The "diplomat trick": why does it exist?

[Subbak]

For those who would not know what I'm talking about: when you send a diplomat to improve relations with a country, you get a immediate small relations boost, in addition to the monthly tick. Which means if you send your diplomat on November 11 at the start of the campaign, you can recall them on December 1st and send them again on December 12. If you do this every month (losing one day each time), you can get to a +100 modifier roughly twice as fast (in game time, not real time obviously) as you normally would.

Why does this exist? This makes it so that often the best thing you can do (if you need good relations with a country as fast as possible, or simply it's the beginning of the game and you want everybody to start liking you), is extremely tedious, sending and recalling most of your diplomats twice a month.
If for game balance the devs want the inital relations boost when you send a diplomat, they could make it occur only if a diplomat was not improving relations on the last monthly tick. If for some reason they want human players to improve relations faster than the AI (since the AI doesn't do that), simply increase the rate at which human players increase relations.
But currently the game is made so that the correct way to play is unfun (on this aspect, I'm not claiming hte whole game is unfun), which is pretty bad game design...

 

[CrabHelmet]

Agreed. I have no idea why this still exists.

 

[grommile]

Resolving it consumes labour, Paradox's supply of labour per unit time is finite and subject to many different demands, and we haven't seen the complete patch notes for 1.12 yet.

 

[WeissRaben]

Honestly, it is so mind-numbingly tedious that I don't care about its existence. I tried it once, and gave up after five months.

 

[Subbak]

Honestly, it is so mind-numbingly tedious that I don't care about its existence. I tried it once, and gave up after five months.

I don't always do it, but when improving relations with someone is time-sensitive (I need it for a mission, or I need an alliance super-fast) I'll use the trick. I hate it, but I would also hate wasting game time. If I did not have that ability my enjoyment would therefore be increased.

 

[Wizzington]

Fixed in 1.12.

 

[HerrStarr]

Fixed in 1.12.

How?

 

[RaptorCommander]

NOOOOO!!!!!

 

[Wizzington]

How?

Resending diplomat won't give instant opinion boost if you already have >0 from improve relations

 

[spinoza013]

Let's see DDRJake redo some of his adventures now.

 

[zerosius]

Resending diplomat won't give instant opinion boost if you already have >0 from improve relations

Oh boy...

 

[Seraphithan]

Resending diplomat won't give instant opinion boost if you already have >0 from improve relations

Ah crap that will make relation management in the HRE that much more annoying.

 

[DSwann]

Let's see DDRJake redo some of his adventures now.

I am sure he is the one who helped fix it ;-)

It is just a number after all

 

[Krajzen]

NOOOOO!!!!!

True man's only ticks are his girlfriend's orgasms.

 

[zdlugasz]

For those who would not know what I'm talking about: when you send a diplomat to improve relations with a country, you get a immediate small relations boost, in addition to the monthly tick. Which means if you send your diplomat on November 11 at the start of the campaign, you can recall them on December 1st and send them again on December 12. If you do this every month (losing one day each time), you can get to a +100 modifier roughly twice as fast (in game time, not real time obviously) as you normally would.

Why does this exist? This makes it so that often the best thing you can do (if you need good relations with a country as fast as possible, or simply it's the beginning of the game and you want everybody to start liking you), is extremely tedious, sending and recalling most of your diplomats twice a month.
If for game balance the devs want the inital relations boost when you send a diplomat, they could make it occur only if a diplomat was not improving relations on the last monthly tick. If for some reason they want human players to improve relations faster than the AI (since the AI doesn't do that), simply increase the rate at which human players increase relations.
But currently the game is made so that the correct way to play is unfun (on this aspect, I'm not claiming hte whole game is unfun), which is pretty bad game design...

Nobody forces you to do it. THere is no correct way to play. You can play whatever way you wish

 

[RobRoy3]

Nobody forces you to do it. THere is no correct way to play. You can play whatever way you wish

Simply not true.

I'd always assumed it was, maybe not quite intended, but considered a desirable "feature". It had the virtue of making it quicker/easier to improve relations with nations fairly close to you, but taking longer to improve relations with very distant lands. The envoy (return) travel time will now be the only factor differentiating between neighbors and nations on the other side of the globe.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Often removing things willy-nilly bothers me but this one doesn't at all. It's micro hell and things that incentivize that won't be missed. Surely "more things to do during peacetime" can be more exciting than getting the entire HRE to +100 in a few years at the cost of lots of RL time!

 

[grommile]

Nobody forces you to do it. THere is no correct way to play. You can play whatever way you wish

I got sick of that argument quite some time ago, watching people try to defend outright landmines in the design of tabletop RPGs. If there is a clearly optimal mode of play in a strategy game, and that mode of play involves hellish micromanagement, then the designers are making the statement, whether by accident or design, that you are supposed to engage in hellish micromanagement if you want to do well.

 

[yerm]

Best change 2015.

 

[lightvsdarkness]

Resending diplomat won't give instant opinion boost if you already have >0 from improve relations

So it's a diplomacy debuff, unless it's compensated. Is it compensated with faster rate or something?